Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 21
Sixty-First Report - Progress on the courts and tribunals reform programme
Published 30 Jun 2023
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee Court Reform Programme: progress review All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
Despite our earlier concerns, the National Audit Office found that the programme costs still may not capture the full costs of reforming the courts and tribunals. This is partly because when reporting the costs of the programme, HMCTS does not include all of the costs associated with its 2021 business case. For example, of the Crown Prosecution Service will fund its own costs to develop interfaces with common platform. As a result, these costs will not show on reform programme expenditure, even though the original budget was expected to cover the full costs of a shared platform.41 We asked HMCTS whether it thought it was important to keep an eye on the costs to the criminal justice system as a whole as there was still a cost to the taxpayer, even if it was not one it was paying for. HMCTS responded that it thought that this was a fair point for it to look at this.42
From: Public Accounts Committee, Sixty-First Report - Progress on the courts and tribunals reform programme (HC 1002), 30 June 2023
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 24 September 2023 (deadline 30 August 2023).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government states that it "agrees with the Committee's recommendation" on each of the six conclusions, describing five as "Recommendation implemented" and one, on assessing the full cost of the programme, with a target implementation date of December 2023.
- On assurance of plans, the response says the programme is "conducting ongoing reviews of plans", overseen by programme boards and a portfolio board, with updated confidence assessments reported against each portfolio-level milestone.
- On access to justice, it commits to publishing four completed assessments in autumn 2023, with further publications "in 2024 and into 2025". Where impacts are identified, it will do further work and, "where appropriate", implement a service fix.
- On full costs, the government will respond within the six-month deadline, considering the proposed inclusions "where they are within the scope of the programme". It adds that in some cases it will be necessary to rely on estimates.
- On savings, it says delay will mean £50 million fewer recurring annual net savings by the end of 2025-26. The full £227 million is "still expected" a year later than originally expected, by the end of 2026-27.